Bumpdate: 38 Weeks

SNOOOWWMMMGGGG errbody! Well, kind of. Earlier in the week snOWMG! This week was all about the weather in our parts. We had a GIANT snowstorm early in the week and it basically just broke the South. We had one good workday in the office and the rest was work from home, which is great, but also being cooped up is NEVER fun. I shared a few photos of it here, if you're interested! Otherwise, bey and I are still hanging out. Ok, let's get into this bumpdate!

According to the emails, the baby is variously the size of: a winter melon, a leek (MMMMMmmmm leek and potato soup! #musttellpatrick) and a ukelele(HOW?!?).

Overview of Last Week –

Baby & Body – I feel HUMONGOID, you know, par for the course at this point. I'm feeling more downward pressure and my waddle is WAY out of control now. According to the OB, bey slowed down on shifting down to engage my pelvis, which means we're still on track for due date delivery or later. I'm not sure how to feel about that. I'm kind of REALLY over being pregnant. This WHOLE experience has been SO fascinating and I've been really enjoying how my body has changed and worked through this. BUT... I'm having A LOT of trouble sleeping and getting around also, I'm also SO swelly, I mean, LOOK AT MY HANDS UP THERE! That ring was BIG on my finger before all this! Also, I don't even want to share my feet, GROSS. The loveliest woman EVER gave me a mani/pedi on Friday and she was so sweet to throw in a REAL foot massage that helped SO much. She said she remembered how this stage felt for her pregnancy for both her children and she so sweetly spent an extra 15 minutes making me feel like a human again. I made sure to tip ALL the extras there. Mamas helping Mamas, I LOVE IT! I'm also having the kind of heartburn that makes my eyes water, I'd SUPER like to eat whole meals again as I feel like I can't eat a lot at any one time, which means I'm eating ALL. DAMN. DAY. My maternity clothes are getting too small and, just, overall, I'm feeling like I'd like to jump into the next step of things. In the meantime, I need to drink more water and calm down. Oh, and my favorite part of the emails I get on what's going on with my body this week? LIGHTNING CROTCH. No joke. EVERY email had a discussion on what this is and I'm NOT looking forward to it. I was also not expecting there to be a thing called lightning crotch. Shall I state again? Pregnancy is SO STRANGE!

Emotions – I'm REALLY REALLY REALLY excited to meet my kid. Like, I didn't expect this. Honestly. I knew I'd want to meet my baby...#obvs... but I didn't realize it would be SO pronounced at this point. Each new week I'm seeing new babies born to the others in our birth classes and such and I'm just getting really anxious to have my turn. That said, I'm really having mixed feelings about labor. I totally get why women schedule out inducements and c-sections. This mystery of 'wait, is that a contraction?' is NERVE WRACKING! Also, everyone around me on edge. Mom and Jer have both said they see my text messages and jump out of their skin thinking it's the 'go-time' text. I'm also noticing it at work too. I'm trying to stay on top of things and keep everyone in the loop with where I am on projects and I think I'm freaking them out with it. That said, I'm in a role that requires quite a bit of time-sensitive work, so I can't really, in good conscience, NOT keep everyone up to date. I was originally going to take this coming week to start my "pre-leave" and just cool it at home. I took a bit to think it through and realized I'd drive myself batty puttering around at home. So I'll work up until go-time. I'm glad I've committed to that. At least I can have a normal routine until the time comes when things go down. Otherwise, I've got two-ish more weeks left and I want to just be present with the girls and Patrick and be READY when the time comes. Having normal days will help with that. I'm also stepping into my meditation practice a bit more. I want to be able to get myself into the right head space now, so that I don't flip out when labor starts. I also want to be able to go as long as I can in active labor before getting my epidural and I think this will help with that.

Home – Now that the nursery is done, I've just been taking a once over on everything else in the apartment to make sure we're ready to go when bey decides to make her/his entrance. Mostly just tidying here, dusting there, but also pulling out all of our extra linens for visitors to use and making sure our new bottles are sterilized and put away for when they're needed. I put together my 'Mom Cart' full of diapers, wipes, breast bump and bags, snacks and water and various other items that I can wheel around with me when we come home and bey and I putter around. Patrick put together our bassinet and we're going to do a thorough bedroom clean this weekend and add bey's little space, so I'm looking forward to being able to get used to our new arrangement (we're switching bed-sides so I can get up in the middle of the night without waking up Patrick) and have a little space for our tiny one to brighten up. I've also received the last few Amazon orders to create what we're calling the 'fun box' in the bathroom that has all my SUPER sexy postpartum body care items in it. Let me tell you: being able to see that makes me shudder EVERY time I look at it, but I know it's going to be a lifesaver after labor! I added a few labels to the boxes in there and that label just says 'Mom Life' and I'm anticipating some really fun comments on it from our house visitors while I'm in the hospital! Listen folks: pregnancy was a WHOLE bunch and ladies gotta do what ladies gotta do to take care of the aftermath! 😎 I'm also allowing myself to gather some inspiration for projects beyond the nursery. Towards the end of my leave, I'll be putting bey in daycare for a few hours a few times a week to get both of us used to being separated, and during that time, I'd like to tackle a few projects I've been putting off. By then I'll have our photos back from our 'Fresh 48' session (we're having a photographer come into the hospital and capture photos of all of us while bey is fresh and new), so lots to choose from for framing and hanging, I'll also be gearing up to start sleep training bey in her/his nursery, so I'll need to be considering how we're going to make sure the room is ready for bey full-time. I will say: it's nice to start thinking about feeling more normal after this time of pregnancy and planning for bey. Looking forward like this has me feeling less nervous about how rough having a newborn will be and feeling more excited to have our little one settled into our life and being parents.

ETC – In thinking about that life, post-newborn, I'm also allowing myself to think a little more about what it will be like to be a Mom. I know that sounds weird, but I'm still in pregnancy mode and thinking more about the mechanics of motherhood than the actual identity of it. I'm excited about being a parent, but also want to make sure I'm not losing myself in my kid. I've been taking some time this week to think more about who I want to be as a mom and parent and partner and also thinking about how this time is going to change me. It's an interesting exercise in the unknown. To make it feel a bit more concrete, I've tried to start with something that might seem a bit more selfish but is something I can think about that has a more practical solidity to it: my post-baby style. I've started with something I'll mention more below but is actually helping to distract me a bit now: my 'Mum-Face'. One of the makeup artists I've been following on Instagram has just had her second child and she's been sharing how she quickly and efficiently puts herself together for the day and I've been practicing her routine to make it my own. It's actually been a really great way to calm myself down and also to learn how to use less makeup more effectively. I'm a sucker for trying a new product and it's blown my makeup bag WAY up. Her use of a few good multi-tasking products, from Bobbi Brown (who she represents and a line I already love) is helping me to imagine myself after this baby is born in a positive way. Again, it's not a huge thing and can be seen as a bit self-centered, but it really is helping me to visualize things in a more positive way, without the scariness of image of a bleary-eyed mess that can dominate things. I'm also thinking a bit more about fashion and the clothing I'll be wearing when I go back out into the world. I'll need to consider wearing things that make breastfeeding easier and are a bit more generous in proportion as I don't imagine I'll look the same for a while, but will make me feel lovely and will wear practically for me and my new lifestyle. It's an interesting exercise in thinking about the function of my style as well as the look. I'll share more when I have a better idea of what I'm thinking.

Things I Found and Loved This Week –

I've spent an inordinate amount of time thinking about and planning for my maternity leave. I've picked up a good number of comfy clothes that will fit my in-between size and have picked up a ton of postpartum care items, but never really thought about my post-baby style. I follow this gorgeous girl on YouTube and Instagram and have found myself inspired by her optimism and have been practicing her '5 Minute Mum-Face' in anticipation of giving myself a bit of a perk up for days when we'll have visitors or when I want to venture forth into the world with bey. She's just recently had her second child and I'm loving going back through her video catalog and boning up on my makeup skills.

Have you been following the Babe.net Aziz Ansari story? In our house, we've had SEVERAL heated arguments on what's going on. Patrick believes it was poorly handled but important and I believed the girl and felt the conversation about the subject was more important than the handling. We've been going back and forth on how to think about this and what we think about the way the media has handled it (we decided: REALLY badly). This write-up over at Jezebel is the smartest observation I've yet seen that matches my position on things. Badly executed in a way that harmed the victim, but clear in pointing out the importance of the actual point of the original piece: something is VERY wrong in our dating culture. It's worth your read and I'd love to hear what you think about it. Now that we're going to be parents, we're finding ourselves wrestling more and more with all of this and being that I've, unfourtuntely, had my own #metoo experience, it's supreamly important to us that our child understands why all of this is so important.

A fantastic hack to help you think about your use of gendered language! I CONSTANTLY find myself using 'guys' as a genertic term to refer to groups of people and it always bothers me when I realize it. I've done just as Ana Marie suggested and set my autocorrect to change 'guys' to 'folks' to help me remember, and you should too!

Speaking of awesome people on Instagram, this Kangaroo rescue group in Australia (obvs) is SO MUCH FUN to look through! I love seeing them pop up in my feed and love seeing their rescue marsupials in action!

I hope everyone has a lovely week! HOPEFULLY we're done with this snow business here. It's gorgeous, but WOOF is it a thing to work around. Cheers, everyone!